PHOENIX — It was a rather sudden bit of feedback on how much the Phoenix Suns would miss Kevin Durant (left calf strain), particularly in crunch time, in a 127-118 overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings.
Sacramento added DeMar DeRozan in the offseason to form the NBA’s best one-two combo of clutch scoring with De’Aaron Fox. DeRozan is widely regarded as one of the top closers in the last decade while Fox won the clutch award two seasons ago.
Phoenix (8-2) entered Sunday 7-0 in clutch time, largely because of Durant, who was the favorite for that award just a little under three weeks into the season. Without him, the Suns showed a lot of fight but didn’t have enough shot-making late or on-ball defense to stop either guy.
DeRozan was 9-of-10 from the field once the fourth quarter started. His only miss was with six seconds left down one on the midrange looks he had been calmly knocking down all quarter. That rebounding opportunity was tipped in by Sacramento’s Keegan Murray for the Kings to take the lead.
Devin Booker drew a foul before the following inbounds pass, therefore giving him one free throw while keeping possession, but he couldn’t follow that make with one at the buzzer for the win.
In overtime, DeRozan scored the Kings’ next eight points across a 1:54 span to put them up six. From there, Fox had his turn, scoring on each of the next four possessions to ice the game. The two combined to shoot 15-of-18 in the last 17 minutes of the game.
Bradley Beal has seen DeRozan’s mastery up close over the years with his past time sharing the Eastern Conference with DeRozan.
“Yeah, he gon’ get right to the elbow, pump fake your ass and shoot — there’s nothing you can do about it,” Beal said.
DeRozan getting hot after beginning the game 5-of-15 is the type of scenario when you’d typically see Durant take on the matchup himself. He will even do that against smaller guards like Fox. Without him, Royce O’Neale tried to take on that task and struggled.
Rookie Ryan Dunn, who started in place of Durant, had some success earlier in the game defending DeRozan but head coach Mike Budenholzer elected to go in favor of the more reliable shooter and spacer on offense. Through that strategic choice, Phoenix was outscored 16-7 in overtime.
“We weren’t physical enough with ’em, I think we let [DeRozan] kind of walk to the midrange a bit — granted, he made a couple just right over them,” Beal said. “That’s what he do, he’s an elite shot-maker.”
The Kings keyed in on Booker more with Durant sidelined, sending extra help his way constantly. Booker sparked ball movement for 3s all evening with 12 assists and could have had close to 20 had the Suns knocked a few more down. They were 18-of-57 (31.6%) from 3.
“Yeah, I think we shot over 50 3s and a lot of ’em were good looks and we’ll make more,” Booker said.
The Suns won’t just take 3s to that high of a volume strictly on principle, so the number speaks to a relatively solid process. They just have to make more when they take that many.
Booker made three midrange jumpers in the first three minutes and change of the fourth quarter to put Phoenix up 11 but saw even more extra defensive attention from there and didn’t have the gas tank to score over it. His illness that popped up on Friday’s injury report clearly wore him down and he thought it was fair to say as much.
Beal came up limp at some point in the fourth quarter with a tweak of his ankle and played through it before DeRozan rolled up on his left knee in overtime. He was in serious pain and unsuccessfully tried to walk it off at first before eventually getting enough adrenaline going to finish the game.
Beal said the pain in his knee was so intense that he couldn’t even remember which ankle he tweaked while noting the ankle was fine and x-rays on his knee were negative. He thinks the knee will just be a pretty nasty bruise, but we’ll see what Monday’s injury report brings.
Booker was 9-of-22 for 23 points while Beal added a team-high 28 on 9-for-18. Beal scored on two straight trips in clutch time that had it 107-104 Suns with 1:51 remaining but they just couldn’t stop the Kings’ dynamic duo.
Sacramento has been a terrible 3-point shooting team this year and it persisted on Sunday with a 6-for-28 (21.4%) mark by players not named Kevin Huerter (5-for-9). DeRozan finished with 34 points and Fox’s number was 21. Fox was at one point 4-for-16 before finishing 6-of-7 the rest of the way. He is playing through a left hand injury that he essentially admitted on Friday was one he isn’t willing to sit out a month-plus to let fully heal without interruption.
Jusuf Nurkic was questionable coming into the game due to a sore left ankle. He went on to play through it in the first half before getting ruled out at halftime. Mason Plumlee and Oso Ighodaro commanded the center minutes in the second half. Phoenix loses some quality small-ball 5 lineups without Durant as well.
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